Creating Evil

If you could see my living room, you would see one wall covered in posters where I have outlined the qualities and past of several of my characters in The Nedaran Prophecy. The most intriguing and difficult one of my characters to work out has been my antagonist. I have been working on trying to figure out what makes this guy tick and why he would be considered evil on and off for the last couple of weeks. I sent my most recent notes off to Stephanie for her input, but I thought I would go ahead and post here what I have learned about the process.

- It is imperative to know why the evil guy does what he does.
- Even if the reader never knows why, it is important for the writer to understand what triggered the antagonist to go down the path of destruction.
- It is vital to know why he thinks he is right and everyone else is wrong.
- It is often more difficult to understand the antagonist's past rather than the hero's.
- To have an intriguing story you must make your antagonist smarter than the average guy and always a step ahead of the hero.

The struggle is to try and balance all that information to make your evil guy a three-dimensional character, but still someone that the hero can eventually conquer. It has been an interesting journey to discover who the bad guy is in our story and I hope that when Stephanie and I are done the reader will have come to understand him as I have.

Excitement & Nerves

Phew, that is over with...for the moment. Stephanie and I just finished revising the first three chapters of The Dawn of Change and submitted it to a local contest. Now we only have to wait three months for the results. I really like the changes we made though.

Now we get to take a short break before working like mad to make the other changes we've decided in order to make our main characters more likeable. We have three months to make all the changes possible before I am pitching the story to an agent from New York that I will be meeting with at a writer's conference. This is BIG!!! It's one thing to try and convince an agent to be excited about your book through a letter or email. It is something totally different to get them excited about, not only your book, but you as an author in a one-on-one, in-person interview. If anyone has any tips I would love to hear them.

In the meantime, don't give up on your dream either. Keep on writing and never give up hope.

Giveaway on Anne Bradshaw Website

Not only should you check out the giveaway on my book review website fabulousreads.blogspot.com but you should check out this fantastic giveaway on Anne Bradshaw's Website, Not Entirely British, for a $50 gift certificate to LDSWA. Go check out her blog and the rules to this contest.

The Princess and the Hound Giveaway

The time has come. My friend Stephanie and I are hosting a book giveaway on Fabulous Reads starting today and running through June 13th. Thanks to author Mette Ivie Harrison we have a signed and dated copy of The Princess and the Hound to give the winner who will be chosen via random drawing on Saturday, June 14th. For rules and reviews of Mette's books please check us out at FabulousReads.blogspot.com.